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CIO Interview Series: Executive Director- Information Systems, HPCL

Mr. Sathiavageeswaran joined HPCL in 1983 as a Management trainee. He has been deeply involved in the corporation for over 2 decades now. Currently the Executive Director- Information Systems, Mr. Satya reports to the CEO and is responsible for all IT applications and systems in the Corporation. (Development, Implementation, support, Security, Infrastructure and technology)

Taking some time out of his busy schedule he shares with developerWorks on what makes HPCL a technologically advanced corporation. He also shares his personal passion for technology – from IT all the way to the kitchen!

The Oil industry is facing a lot of
challenges – especially in an environment where the price of crude is rising. We
buy crude at a higher cost as opposed to the end product price hence there is significant
pressure on cash flow and profitability of the company. In this situation, the
question remains, so how do you balance your need for growth and efficiency
with such under recoveries? How do you make operations of the company more efficient
so we can reduce costs? More importantly, how can IT contribute to this – it
could be manpower, administrative, transportation.

How
does IT in your company act as a business enabler?

At HPCL, we are continually
striving for better operational efficiency and optimize costs – it could be in
various ways - reduce process cycle times, more visibility of information, more
accurate data.

What to
you are the new focus areas over the next decade? Where is your company vis a
vis these?

We are a largely dispersed organization;
operating over 400+ locations in the country. Our IT capabilities have to be
accessible to users across and our field force across. Our focus area is to
move to a Private cloud. We are already in the process of centralizing all our
IT resources to one place, to offer services at an optimum cost. To this
extent, we are even consolidating people to centrally offer capabilities. From
here on, we will explore the possibilities of further consolidation of servers;
reduce cost of operations through green initiatives. However, we are seriously
debating security concerns; up to private cloud we would do, but beyond that, would
treading cautiously.

Cloud needs major telecommunication
capabilities – hence I don’t know how far it ll go, given the way cloud is
positioned today. Enterprise Mobility is another
critical area for us; enterprise mobility of making available the capabilities
of various applications onto mobile devices – handheld, tablets, low end
laptops.

3 important areas need to be looked
at – to confirm decision makers on real time basis, data collection – capturing
info from field on stock, inspection, placing orders and routing processing –
workflows, act while on the move.

Which
would you consider is one of your most significant investment/s in 2010 and its
benefits?

Our B2B oil exchange project is a
big one that requires minimal manual intervention. This project automates the
oil exchange transaction between HPCL and other oil marketing companies like
BPCL and IOCL.

There is
a substantial amount of transactions that happen between these three oil
marketing companies, in terms of buying and selling of finished goods from one
another (oil exchange transactions). Each of these transactions is of
high-value and happens over a number of transports such as tank trucks,
pipeline, wagons etc. Reconciliation was typically done at the end of the month
with joint certificates being exchanged between the companies. The entire
process was manual and thus prone to errors and increased turn-around times.
HPCL desired that the process of oil exchange be automated such that it
requires minimal manual interaction and leads to a smoother reconciliation
process.

HPCL
needed an integration platform that would be agnostic to the transaction
systems on the other side and at the same time integrate seamlessly to their in-house
JD Edwards ERP.IBM's solution based on
the WebSphere Process Server, WebSphere Transformation Extender and WebSphere
Adapter for JD Edwards achieved this seamlessly, meeting all the requirements
of a secure auditable transaction. The solution would also help HPCL add more
partners onto the Exchange Hub with minimal efforts as and when new partners
come up.

What is
your next big bet in 2011?

GPS and other technologies that
will give relevant, real-time information will be big; it could be in the area
of logistics, transportation etc. We are also doing some proof of concepts in
this area – nothing concrete as of yet and at quite a nascent stage.

Your
challenges you foresee going into 2011, and your plans to address those?

For me, it would be increased awareness
of risk that IT poses to the organization, especially IT security and build
sufficient mitigation for any risk that our organization is exposed to.Today, more and more real-time
payments are being done and that is a very sensitive area for security.

HPCL has been one of the pioneers
of technology for decades. The organization has used this very well and very
agreeably. The wish list from business only gets larger – so really there is a
huge acceptance and dependence on IT

How do
you define the success of an initiative?

Before taking up an initiative we
try and put down the expectation of outcomes - internal expectation or business
expectations of what we will bring to the table.

At the end of the roll out or a few
weeks of usage if it is seen that the outcomes are achieved, it will be
success. When people demand more and more of
enhancements, then we know our initiatives are successful. For all our initiatives we have
capabilities across the spectrum, from basic to value adds.

Basic are must have capabilities –
users have to use it. Value adds are capabilities that are nice to have – if
note used, is not a show stopper. We get enough and more requests for value add
capabilities from business. That is indicative of what we bring to the table.

The other indicator is return on
investment, so monetary value. We haven’t not really used this much as an
indicator but there is an example I could share - we enabled e collections and the
kind of savings which we got from account of interest cost savings – would have
paid of significant part of overall IT investment.

Do you
see IBM as part of your journey?

IBM is currently providing a
significant component of infrastructure which runs our ERP, hardware and
software. Obviously we are dependant on their infrastructure to run it
smoothly. We hope to keep using these to take our company forward

Your
expectation/s from IBM in your journey

We would look forward to continued
interaction on how capabilities’ can be exploited. We want IBM as an Industry
expert bring to us that knowledge and experience.

What’s
your advice to IT leaders for this year?

I would say rather than looking at
technology per se, one must see the outcome and the business alignment the
technology is trying to bring - that is key. More than costs see the business
value that it offers. If you can identify and communicate to our business
leaders that tangible or intangible all your initiatives are going to be
successful.

Keeping
aside work, what are your other interests?

I spend a lot of time reading on technology.
I am a gadget freak – from IT to the kitchen! I play bridge and have
represented HPLC for the past 2 decades.

What is
your recipe for success?

Getting down to details and putting
your full effort and concentration on your job. Don’t confine yourself to what
you are seeing – expand your vision and offer more than expected. Look beyond
what has been tabled in front of you – look at the big picture.

What
would you consider your source of inspiration?

Nothing specific really. I like to
read about success stories, biographies of people who have achieved great names
starting with nothing ….whether it is new companies or industrial empires. I
specially enjoy technology, so I am more inclined to follow people in this
space.

Can you
elaborate on your personal journey to where you are today?

I joined HPCL in 1983 as a Management
trainee. I initially worked in the Corporate Planning Department for 6 years
where I was involved in development of mathematical models for optimization of
logistics and supply chain and in project monitoring.

From there on it has been 20 years in
the Information Technology Department. I have been responsible for the
computerization of over 450 locations across the country; this included setting
up of computers, networks, software development, installation, training and
support of applications for the core management processes in the field
locations.

I was a technical team lead of a
multi functional team set up for the implementation of the JDEDwards ERP system
across the country. The ERP system which supports over 4200 users was
implemented with users from over 450 locations connecting to the system.

Currently I am the Executive
Director- Information Systems reporting to the CEO (Chairman & Managing
Director) and responsible for all IT applications and systems in the
Corporation. (Development, Implementation, support, Security, Infrastructure
and technology)

Do you
know of the IBM Smarter Planet? What according to you is Smarter Planet?

Yes, seen so much in the press, in all
IBM events too.

From a philosophical sense I would
say every generation should be leaving the planet in a better shape than what
it inherited, be it environment, resource utilization, healthcare etc. This is
a holistic approach – technology is one part of it.